Romania Lobbies For Role In Nato, U.s. Economy

July 22, 1998|By R.C. Longworth, Tribune Staff Writer.

Emil Constantinescu, the president of Romania, said Tuesday that his Balkan country is overcoming its troubled history and deserves to join NATO and the European Union and to receive more investment than wary U.S. businesses have been willing to give so far.

Constantinescu, a bearded geologist and academic who gets high marks from foreign experts for his democratic and reformist principles, was hosted in Chicago by one of those companies, the Chicago-based oil giant Amoco, which paid for lunch for 600 people to hear him speak. Amoco hopes to sign a deal soon to exploit Romania's rich natural-gas resources.

Romania largely wasted the seven years after the 1989 overthrow of Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu.

A neo-Communist government led by then-President Ion Iliescu balked at political and economic reforms and tolerated widespread corruption.

As a result, NATO and the EU rejected Romania's application to be among the first ex-communist nations to enter the two organizations, and Western investment has lagged far behind that in other East European nations.

Constantinescu was elected president in 1996 on a reformist platform.

His reforms have been plagued by a particularly entrenched bureaucracy, government instability, strikes and corruption, but he said here that the problems are being overcome.

"Romania is already acting as though it is a NATO member," he said in an interview. Romania has taken part in UN missions to Bosnia, Macedonia and other trouble spots and is acting as a "pillar of regional stability" in the Balkans.

The goal of NATO membership has engendered broad support for democratic reforms, Constantinescu said.

"For us there is no alternative but integration into NATO," he said. "Now it is up to the NATO countries and the American Congress. We feel we are ready."

The EU's decision to pass over Romania while inviting five other ex-communist governments-- Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Estonia--also stung.

But Constantinescu said at the Amoco luncheon that the process of admitting these nations will take so long--about a decade-- "that one can't establish a group of hierarchies.

We need a fast-track lane, so that countries that reform, that carry out their responsibilities, may have the opportunity to overtake countries that at this moment are ahead of them."

Partly in response to Romania's plea, the EU has set up an annual review for all applicants and has agreed to negotiate with countries that make unexpectedly fast progress.

The five favored nations used the years since the death of communism to institute reforms and, as a result, attracted foreign investment.

Constantinescu said Romania wants investment, especially from U.S. companies.

He used his visit to Chicago to announce that a Romanian consulate will be opened in Chicago to cover the Midwest and will include a representative from the State Ownership Fund, in charge of privatizing state-owned industries in Romania.

U.S. businesses in Romania have complained that bureaucracy and corruption interfere with doing business there. Constantinescu said he has appointed an ombudsman, within the Privatization Ministry, to handle such complaints.

Romania wants the types of investment that will benefit the investor and Romania itself, he said. But he balked at financial guarantees against loss for U.S. corporations.

"I don't see," he said, "why a poor government should extend commercial guarantees to a company with a larger budget than the budget of Romania."